Working Hours/ Travelling Hours situation

elasticated17

Hello

The company I work for have opened a new office which is an hours train ride (plus half hour bus/walking to station) away. It can take longer than this as well due to it being a really busy train line/delays all the time!

All staff live in the city that the original office is at. There is one person who cannot work at the new location as the job he does only has equipment at the original office.

Out of the 3 of us left only 2 of us are being made to work in the new office. We are being threatened with redundancy unless we work at the new office. To be fair to the company they are paying for our travel expenses as we do not earn enough to pay commuter fares. Due to the nature of the work we have to be open from 8 in the morning until 8 at night.

The problem is that they want both of us to do 12 hour shifts - 3 a week each. But because we are contracted to a certain amount of hours a week there is a shortfall which they want us to make up in the original office so we would be basically working 3 x 12 hour shifts in the new office then another 7 hour shift in the original office and have 1 day off a week and our weekends. The problem we have is that in reality it takes at least 3.5 hours a day traveling to the office and then to do a 12 hour shift as well is going to be exhausting. By the time we have done 3 in a row we are going to be alert enough to do any more work in the same week. The job is highly pressurised and if mistakes are made it can be very costly to the company.

The job that we do is rarely advertised and there are no other companies in the city we live in that have the need for our skills so if we were to be unemployed we would have to start from scratch and forge new careers.

We would like to know if the company should be considering our traveling time among our contacted hours. They seem to think its acceptable to ask us to leave home at 6.30 in the morning and not get back until 22:00 at night.

Any help would be greatly appreciated - we just want to know how we should approach this situation. We love our jobs but we just want it to be a fair situation.

Thanks

getmore4less

I think :

They should not have moved you to the new office.

They should have identified a potential redundancy situation since your cuurent job at the current location will no longer exist.

put you at risk and began consultation identifiying the potentialy suitable alternatives. the alternative as they say is redundancy.

Thing is they know you can't get other similar work.

what is in your contract about place of work and any mobility clauses.


But given you want the job, I think you probably need to negotiate

Why not negotiate overnight accomodation while doing the shifts rather return travel for 2 nights, perhaps even do a few more hours, if possible, keeping within the WTD.

This will give you more time off at home, with the travel you get home and probly eat/sleep with no time for much else.

Perhaps have a change over during the day one of the days to reduce some travel at unsocial hours.

How easy are you to replace?

elasticated17

Thanks for your reply.

In the new location I am easy to replace as there are more people with my skills base. This also means there are jobs in the new location that I could apply for but the issue is that travel expenses would not be paid and I would have to move house.

The idea of accommodation is a good one in essence but there is in reality no way they would pay for it. They would still have to pay travel expenses for the time we are staying away from home as its cheaper for them to buy a weekly ticket for us as its cheaper overall than paying for 2 days travel (due to times of travel restrictions) The other issue is that we both have long term partners at home and living away from home is going to put a strain on relationships. I understand not have a job would have even more strain but at least I would know where I stand.

I am going to discuss your suggestion of a change over day. At least every 2 weeks we could have a better pattern. Its a horrible situation and ive been up trying to work our a fair schedule but I still end up with 12.5 hours short of of my contracted hours per month!

SarEl

You really must be careful here. If your current job in its current location is disappearing then you are redundant. If you accept this role in another location then this is a "suitable alternative" in law and you cannot later change your mind and ask for redundancy. And provision for travel or other allowances is likely to be temporary - if it is permanant then it becaomes a taxable benefit as an employer is not allowed to pay for your travel to and from work except as a temporary measure during things like this type of relocation. So you may find that the travel or other allowances disappear withot a trace in the future - if they don't they will certainly become taxable which will have in impact on your income.

Premier_2

As SarEl say, you need to be careful and decide on what you really want.

You work for a what appears to be a small company with no local competition (no one else wants your specific skills). Unfortunately your position has effectively become redundant by the operational requirements of the employer (office move, change in working hours)

The employer obviously is aware of and values the specialised skills you possess and is why they have offered not only to transfer you to the new location but also to recompense you for the cost of the travel. If this is to be a permanent thing, perhaps you could try to negotiate that the added benefit is sufficient to not only cover the cost of the travel but the cost of the deductions SarEl refers to?

pimento

I work 90 minutes (each way) from my job and would love to have my travel expenses paid for!

teabelly

Sounds like they knew your skills were more readily available in the new location.... Long travel times and long work hours could damage your health and relationship far more than an overnight stay. Is there anyway you could between you afford to have a flat/long term travelodge or similar accommodation nearby? Would it be quicker to travel by car?

If not I think you may be better off in the long run going for redundancy and finding something else. Use the money to retrain for skills that are needed locally to where you are now if you like living there.

If they want cover 8 til 8 then they aren't far off the 11 hour minimum break between shifts if the expect one person to do those hours on consecutive days. This doesn't include travelling time unfortunately. I don't see how it can work. What happens when someone is ill, or is on holiday and they still want 8 til 8 with so few people?

elasticated17

Thanks everyone for your comments.

I agree, we are worried that the expenses will suddenly stop. Today we had a meeting and it was made clear that the new location business needs to work or we are all out of a job. However they are still going to be pushing the original location too as the company likes being a regional company and in the business we are in there is a government quota for clients to use regional facilities.

So we have negotiated a better working timetable so we only do 2 12 hour shifts in a row. And the rest of our hours are in the original location.

We have other members of staff that are now contracted to cover our holidays/sick days.

Its not ideal but we have to be grateful that the company are wanting to keep us as staff but we're not stupid to think that our jobs are safe. I didnt realise there were laws to say they cant continue to pay our travel expenses. Does anyone have anymore information on this?

Thanks again